Chapter I: “God’s prophets of the Beautiful these poets are.” (3)

110. Q. Who engaged in the siege against Troy? A. The confederate kings of all Greece, with Agamemnon as commander-in-chief.

111. Q. What was the occasion of the wrath of Achilles? A. The arbitrary interference of Agamemnon to deprive Achilles of a female captive, Briseis, and usurp her to himself.

112. Q. What at length incites Achilles to return to the field? A. The death of Patroclus, his close friend, slain by the Trojans.

113. Q. What is the result as to Achilles? A. He slays Hector, the Trojan champion, and is himself killed by Paris.

114. Q. What forms the subject of the “Odyssey”? A. The adventures of one of the Greek chieftains, Ulysses, or Odysseus.

115. Q. When and how does the “Iliad” itself close? A. Before the fall of Troy, and with the death and funeral rites of Hector.

116. Q. What are some of the best known translations of the “Iliad”? A. Chapman’s, Pope’s, Cowper’s, Derby’s and Bryant’s.

117. Q. Of what are some of the most noted passages in the first book of the “Iliad” descriptive? A. The descent of Apollo, the wrangle between Achilles and Agamemnon, the promise of Jupiter to Thetis, and the feast of the gods.

118. Q. What does the second book of the “Iliad” recount? A. How Jupiter sends a deceiving dream to Agamemnon, to induce that chieftain to make a vain assault on the Trojans.

119. Q. With what does the book close? A. With a catalogue of the Greek forces assembled.

120. Q. To us who read in the light of present views what is a feature of the “Iliad” fatal to any genuine interest in the story? A. The introduction of supernatural agencies into the action of the poem.

121. Q. What is one of the prominent scenes introduced in the third book of the “Iliad”? A. A duel between Paris, the thief, and Menelaus, the husband of Helen.

122. Q. What takes place at the crisis of the duel? A. Venus steps in and carries Paris off to his bed-chamber in the palace of Priam.

123. Q. In the fourth book what is described by a simile, one of the most nobly conceived and nobly expressed of all that occur in the “Iliad”? A. The advance of the Achaians to battle.

124. Q. What noted hero is introduced in the fifth book of the “Iliad”? A. Æneas, the Trojan hero of Virgil’s poem, the “Æneid.”

EDITOR’S OUTLOOK.

THE OUTLOOK FROM THE PLAINFIELD OFFICE.

He must be a very indifferent man, indeed, who does not feel the quick flush of pride at the growth and success of the institutions with which he is connected. Doubly glad will he be if it be one for whose enlargement he has labored.

We surmise that there are very few of our readers—many of whom are more than members of the C. L. S. C., being actual workers for its interests—but that will be eager to know the present outlook for our work from the Plainfield office, anxious to know what are the prospects for 1884-’85.

Nowhere excepting at the central office is it possible to sound our work, to know its breadth, its depth, the permanency of its interest among our members, and its growth among the people. Here we can gauge its dimensions. And, perhaps, the first sign, and certainly it is a most significant one, is that which every casual visitor at our business headquarters must observe at once, as he looks in upon the busy workers of the office; the work is too big for its quarters. The mammoth mails are swelling beyond the prescribed boundaries. The office must grow with the C. L. S. C., and next spring it is decreed that there shall be a Chautauqua floor at Plainfield instead of an office, and that there, side by side, shall be found the business centers of the two great divisions of the “new education”—the C. L. S. C. and the Chautauqua University.

Of equal import is the work that the office secretary and her associates are being called upon to do this fall. Much work is always the sign of growth. It proves a demand for that which you are able to supply. It shows that you are filling a needed place. The C. L. S. C. never made more work than it does now—the most conclusive proof that the cause is prospering. The mails have become enormous. The average number of letters daily received through September and up to this date was over six hundred. These letters are the pulses of public feeling toward this work. They contain queries of all kinds respecting the methods of the Circle; they ask for circulars in great quantities, saying that there are everywhere people waiting to receive them; they proclaim enlarged boundaries and steadily increasing strength.

In many towns where the membership has always been large it has been doubled this fall. On October 4th the class of ’88 numbered over 3,000 members, a much larger number than the class of ’87 had at the same time last year.

One particularly encouraging feature is the vigor of the work. The C. L. S. C. grows up _strong_. There are records innumerable in those Cyclopean books at the Secretary’s office of readers who have caught the true idea, that education is life work, and they have joined the C. L. S. C. to stay. There are numbers of established circles, and this fall’s records are increasing the number of post-graduate readers, and the list of circles which have become fixed institutions.

There are, too, some interesting facts to be gleaned from a careful study of these records. We like to know where lie the strongholds of our work, among what kind of people are its rank and file, and here are the answers to our queries. The outlook for the present year shows that, as has been true heretofore, the leaders in the C. L. S. C. are the states of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, California and New England, that close in their train follow Illinois, Iowa and Indiana; that the class of people taking up the work is now, as always, the busy class, whose lives are full of thought and work and plans; that their ages, on an average, lie between twenty and forty years.

The outlook from the Plainfield office is to-day upon an ever growing band of earnest hearted men and women, gathered from all the states and territories of the Union, and from over the seas; it is upon an enthusiasm never before surpassed by any body of students in any land, and it presages, beyond doubting, the largest, grandest year in the history of the movement.

THE DECLINE OF ORATORY.

The political campaign affords a good view of the decline of oratory and of its chief causes. Oratory is not a less potent force on account of any decrease in the production of the talents which under proper culture form the orator. Humanity is probably richer in such gifts. And yet oratory had notice to prepare for an eclipse when printing was invented, and the shadow upon oratorical influence has grown larger in each half century until the illuminating office has passed almost entirely over to the press. In the old campaigns, the orator furnished a feeble press with facts and arguments; in the present campaign the positions are exactly reversed. The press furnishes the ideas, the arguments, the facts, the illustrations. The stump speaker no longer invents; he crams. He is not an original thinker, developing lines of attack and defense, fortifying weak positions and fashioning a line of battle by a single speech. He is the mouthpiece of party opinion, the obedient servant of party tactics, and the illustrator and peddler of other men’s thoughts. And all this work is cut out for him by men who in the press represent both public opinion and party councils of war. Men are living who can remember when the words of Clay, Webster, Calhoun, Seward, Lincoln, were waited for; and the words came—they were battle cries and marching orders. Now nobody waits for any orator, and the orator gets his instructions from the press. It is not very wise to attribute the change to the decline of statesmanship and leadership. It is not clear that the former has declined; it is certain that the latter has not. But the leader is no longer a man who makes a speech, but he has become a man who writes an article or plans a campaign in which the telegraph, the literary bureau, the campaign document, and the contriving genius in himself do the large work. He puts orators into the field and tells them what to say. They are his instruments, very useful instruments, because the love of public speaking is still strong in men; but still oratory uses the tools of the man with a pen and types.

The causes of the changed relations of writer and speaker are made conspicuous by the campaign. A carefully prepared and printed document can be circulated in millions of copies; a speech can be heard by from one to five thousand people only. These words of ours are addressed to one hundred and fifty thousand readers; he is a genius, before whom this present writer would take off his hat, who can collect five thousand men to listen to him on any subject. The press has the large audience, a vast congregation never dreamed of until the press and swift modes of communication made the immense audience possible. Another cause is that, while we have more talents, there are competing demands for the services of those which prevail in argument and persuasion. Fifty years ago this country had no great editors; it could easily furnish a liberal supply of orators. Now it uses up a large amount of its oratorical ability in the editorial rooms. Other pursuits have silenced tongues that might have moved mankind, by employing the brains in mercantile and industrial work on large lines. Many a great railroad man might have been a great orator. But the diversion of born pleaders and debaters to the newspapers sufficiently accounts for their absence from the stump.

The genius for mastery over political thought and action is not blind; it has gone into the press because it could prevail and direct and conquer in the press. It is a natural consequence of the shifting of the central point of persuasive power that we perceive a third cause of the decline of oratory. The press is at the center, the headquarters so to say, while the orator is out in the field making a raid or conducting a skirmish. Centralization is an inevitable effect of the press, the telegraph and the railway. Some effects are to be regretted as we regret the existence of unpleasant incidents of wholesome movements in progress. But our regret can hardly extend to the power of directing a party campaign from a center of the field. It is, in our day, the only way of making it a distinct engagement. It would be a series of isolated skirmishes if we did not have a headquarters and a central committee. This central power speaks in telegraphic clicks and printed words. The orator may be a dashing lieutenant, he can not be a general.

Oratory has taken a subordinate position. The fact has its bearings on deliberative assembly government. Congress can not have great orators in an age when the public will is expressed by editors, and the shape of bills fixed by the newspapers. The business of the legislators is restricted on all sides by the press. The discussions of a legislature are feebleness itself in the presence of the ringing and decisive editorials of influential newspapers. The press hems in the assemblymen within narrow limits of choice; and a speech can not be great when it can not command the field, but only a corner of it. All this does not mean that oratory is dying or to die; it has simply taken a lower place as an agent in argument and persuasion. Nor do we mean that great orators are no longer possible. A great orator, by natural endowment, may make and hold a commanding place—by the aid of the press. But the greatness which will do this must be of a prodigious power and altogether exceptional magnitude. The best men will, as a rule, seek the easier paths to influence, and these lie through types and ink. To speak well will always be an admirable and effective art; but the orator must serve and follow the press. He is a necessary part of the machinery of persuasion, but he is no longer the driving wheel.

THE NEW ORLEANS WORLD’S FAIR.

World’s fairs are special products of modern civilization, and they present in a picturesque and dramatic way the essentials of modern progress, liberty, intercourse between nations, world-wide exchanges. The world’s fairs are for all the world, and representatives of all nations, and the products of all nations are gathered into them. These fairs are milestones of progress; for all new arts and appliances of all lands are exhibited; and they are social gatherings for civilized humanity. If they had no other value than to reflect the unity of mankind under modern liberty and Christianity, they would be worth more than they cost. The spectacle of civilized mankind and the products of their brain and hand collected together in one place is in itself a lesson and an inspiration. The world moves—toward concord, fraternity, unity.

The next world’s fair will have several new values. It is to be held a long distance nearer to the equator than any of its predecessors. It is to be at the mouth of one of the world’s great streams, on the borders of the American Mediterranean, in the midst of the tropical luxuriance of the South. A world’s fair at New Orleans has all the qualities of a luxuriant and inspiring prospective for the imagination. In a dozen ways it invites enthusiasm. It is, for example, one of our reasons for spending so freely our blood and treasure to keep the mouth of the Mississippi within the United States of America; one of the rewards of the South for its own failure to draw a boundary line across that mighty stream. The nation which held the city of New Orleans with a grip of iron, now spends a million and a half to celebrate the concord of humanity in that city. The nation will throng southward this winter, not to secure its territorial integrity, but to celebrate its unity, and the larger unity of mankind. Peace will have larger armies than war had. We shall go in masses, because we want to see our fair South, because it will cost each of us but little, to the land we loved enough to die for, because a tropical world’s fair has for us of the North a fascination which no other fair ever had or ever will have. They are wise down there, and tell us that the tropical display will be the leading feature of the show. Of course it will, and it is that which will attract us and pull us to the exhibition. We have all dreamed of the wealth and magnificence of tropical verdure, and it is to be, so to say, “on tap” in New Orleans next winter when our verdure is asleep under the snow, or nestled at the roots of the trees in saps which are mere possibilities of life next spring. “Tropical display!” What other exhibition could have such a charm?

Rumor says that the railways will astonish us by a schedule of fares which will almost equalize riding and going on foot. They are wise. They could afford to carry us for nothing. Some time, and not a distant time, is to witness a great migration southward. The railroads can richly afford to take us all down there to see the great, rich, open field which has thus far invited us in vain, while we have been following the westering sun to the Pacific coast. Cheap lands, a climate and soil favoring abundant production, undeveloped industrial opportunities, and near markets, attract us, or would attract us, if we realized them. A world’s fair at New Orleans affords the needed incentive to a great movement of many classes of our people to the South. Few of us know the country or its people. The war and the turbulence of the reconstruction era, and political disorders, on which we have no disposition to dwell, have made us strangers and unsympathetic with each other as North and South. The fair will disperse false notions and correct wrong impressions in both sections. It will be a temple of concord for the nation. We shall begin after this celebration of industry to fill up the vacant lands and opportunities of the Gulf region.

The details of the preparations are interesting. The grounds are to be two hundred and twenty-seven acres of land on the banks of the Mississippi. An electric railway is to encircle them, and the spot is accessible both by land and water. The buildings are five in number, and the main edifice is 1,378 feet long and 905 feet wide without courts, and a glass roof, and so arranged within as to afford an unobstructed view of the whole of a magnificent hive of industry. Horticultural Hall is the largest conservatory in the world, 600 feet long and 194 feet wide; and 20,000 plates of fruit, double the number ever before displayed at once, will be shown on the tables. It stands among live oak trees; it will be filled with tropical productions. An infinite variety of southern trees and flowers will be exhibited outside of this hall. Eminent horticulturists are now engaged in arranging for our eyes a bewildering spectacle of the verdure of the lands lying under the rich blessing of the sun. Can New Orleans give shelter and food to all who will visit the exhibition? The people think they can. It is a city of 250,000 people, and from the inception of the enterprise they have had committees at work upon this problem. They are making a thorough canvass of the city for homes for guests; charges will be fixed in advance and strictly supervised throughout the exhibition. Let us all go to the New Orleans World’s Fair.

JUDICIOUS READING OF THE PERIODICAL PRESS.

There is room for good judgment in everything, and daily reading is no exception to the rule. It has come to pass that periodical publications take up a large part of the time and attention of readers, and the tendency in the case is for this kind of printed page to draw too heavily upon us. Most persons in towns read too much newspaper and too little book. The newspapers are abundant, are good as newspapers, and they are full of matter. They claim first attention because they contain the news; they keep attention because the news is abundantly padded, and because the newspaper furnishes other attractive reading. Two or three bad effects of confining ourselves to such reading must be experienced. One is that a feverish interest in events of no great importance is created, and our thoughts revolve about such events. Another bad effect is that the knowledge of the newspaper devourer is imperfect, scrappy, and mixed with errors of fact and principle. The newspaper is produced in haste. Editors have no time to verify all facts and sift out unsound opinions. It is a kind of intellectual bar-room, where all sorts jostle each other and live in good fellowship. The very copiousness and breadth of the journal create a need of better and more accurate reading. Its fragments need to be pieced together by wider knowledge than it gives. It is not enough to say that the present reading habits of our people give to the newspaper the first position as a teacher of the people; one should go on to reflect that this education is not by any means the best. It is too fragmentary and disconnected. The tendency which we regret is not the fault of the press, but it none the less requires the corrective of some kind of restraint upon its habit of monopolizing so large a portion of our time. One may easily learn to read the paper swiftly, get its proper value in a few moments and pass on. Information in more connected and complete forms invites our attention to books; and an intelligent person should save some time for these more valuable products of the press. There is a place, in short, for good judgment in limiting the intellectual tax which the newspaper levies upon us.

Good sense and sound discretion have a place also in our selection of newspapers. They differ, not exactly as one star differeth from another star in glory, but rather as a pure article of merchandise differs from an adulterated article. A clean press, in the general sense of the term, has almost become the rule; but there are still many unclean papers. The obviously unclean are easily shunned. Our danger comes from periodicals conducted for particular ends, to gain which the proprietors will on occasion sacrifice purity. A body of ministers, the Cincinnati Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, has recently condemned in the strongest terms a newspaper long honored for its purity, which has recently depreciated the importance of personal chastity in public men. The incident and its cause are a warning that newspapers change their tone as they change editors, and that a strong desire to promote some object may blind an editor and stain the fairest page. There is but one remedy for this form of the evil, and that is to cast out the newspaper which is guilty of the offense. There is need of caution at this point, because a favorite newspaper, like the king in absolutism, can do no wrong. We grow accustomed to believing it right, to accepting its teachings, to dropping all critical safeguards and taking for good and sound opinions whatever it may deliver to us. This is not a safe habit. Editors like William Cullen Bryant die and their successors may be of another spirit. Few newspapers are the same in moral complexion for twenty years; death and business changes inevitably alter them. Even our favorite newspaper needs watching; and we ought never to condone so gross an outrage on the sanctities of life as the one to which we have reluctantly referred.

Another place for good judgment is in selecting the kind of periodical literature we read. There is a great variety. Some are too light; some are too heavy. Some are frivolous in spirit and purpose; others are so solid that they weigh down the eyelids of the reader. It is not necessary that good reading should be dull, lifeless and soporific. On the other hand, the periodicals which live upon love of fiction and curiosity are too light for the use of people who are living on purpose and for some proper ends. The popular magazine is too light. It is, at best, like dress worn to be looked at rather than for comfort and warmth. The ornamental has become too prominent and too monopolizing. The readers of the popular periodical add little to their wisdom and nothing to their aspirations. Really good results from periodical reading must be had in one of two ways or not at all. Wisdom or inspiration—or both—should come to us from such reading. We are stating the creed and the platform of THE CHAUTAUQUAN. Its special aims are these two: We wish to increase the knowledge of our readers; we wish also to inspire them with two forms of zeal, one which pursues wisdom, and another which aims at sound and pure character. We believe that we help our readers by giving them information and an appetite for it, and that those who read THE CHAUTAUQUAN carefully are stimulated by it to intellectual and moral effort. It has seemed to us that the inspiring quality has disappeared from the average monthly. Indeed, if we look for it in these days we must search in periodicals which have a definite and pronounced moral purpose. There is a pestilent theory that good literature must have only an artistic purpose, that to be in bloody earnest is not good form in letters. THE CHAUTAUQUAN is in earnest; it is the organ of one of the most vigorous and aggressive organizations for popular improvement, and its tone and matter are fixed for it by the high purpose of that organized crusade against ignorance and its consequences. We are not content to please or to satisfy passing curiosity. The whim or incident of the hour gets little of our attention. We are concerned with permanent and useful things. We desire to enlarge the horizon of our readers and fix their interest upon the best and tested objects of living. We are confident that any habitual reader of ours will be made wiser and better. There is not much glitter about such results, and yet they will shine when aimless literature has long ceased to glitter.

EDITOR’S NOTE-BOOK.

What is in a name? Isaac Newton recently committed suicide in New York; Wilbur Fisk is traveling a circuit in Iowa; George Washington was lately sent to prison in Georgia, and Andrew Jackson has escaped from jail in Louisiana. Any attentive newspaper reader can continue the list of great names filling modest roles in contemporary history. Perhaps it is a pity we have not names enough to go around.

* * * * *

In reply to an inquirer: You will learn to write _by writing_, and by always writing as well as you can.

“True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have _learned_ to dance.”

And art is a fruit of laborious practice. Spend as much time writing as you would in learning to play a piano; then you will begin to begin learning the art.

* * * * *

The public lands of the West are being rapidly transferred to private hands. During the year ended June 30th, last, nearly twenty-seven millions of acres were disposed of. Of this total, little more than seven millions were sold. More than fourteen millions were given away as homesteads and timber tracts; and the rest were given away, some 3,300,000 acres going to railroad companies. The total is an increase of more than eight millions over the previous year. And yet an abundance of land remains in the hands of the government. It will be a good while before we shall be crowded in this country.

* * * * *

At this writing it is difficult to predict the end of the troubles in China. It is most probable that France will secure herself in Tonquin. But a suspicion has existed for months that Bismarck had a hand in this affair, and that he has secretly encouraged France, hoping she would come to grief. It is now rumored that he has intimated to the French that they have gone far enough. Most political affairs in Europe are managed by the Chancellor of the German empire, and he is probably the only who can give a good guess at the result of the French imbroglio in China.

* * * * *

Impure water supply is one of the greatest perils of our great cities. Philadelphia and Chicago have old troubles. Washington is more recently in trouble. There is only one thorough remedy, and that is a system of sewage which transports offal outside of the city and restores to the soil as much as possible of the elements of our food. That gives a chance for clean water, and it gives a chance for food for the next generation. Chautauqua employs this system, and has pure wells on the hillside and a pure lake at its feet.

* * * * *

It seems to us that more property has been burned up this summer than is usual in the warm portion of the year. Insurance agents say that accidental fires are much more common in years of financial depression than in those of prosperity; and they think out a moral connection between the two sets of phenomena. Let us hope that the improvement in the times will go on rapidly, else the winter may be one of unexampled severity—for insurance companies.

* * * * *

A pleasant piece of statistic tells us that our people produce forty-eight bushels of grain per capita, and consume forty-one bushels per capita; and both these figures are the highest in the world. We raise more grain and eat more food than any other people. That test of prosperity is decisive. We have our troubles, but let us “think on our mercies.”

* * * * *

Jerry McAuley, the evangelist of the slums, died last month. There is refreshment in the man’s history. Born and trained among the thieves of the worst quarter of New York, he got into prison under a sentence for fifteen years, became a Christian in prison, and spent the rest of his life reclaiming the fallen men and women of his native city. Men _do_ reform under Christian forces, and a reformed man _may_ do a glorious work.

* * * * *

Stolen marriages are not usually happy ones. In those cases, especially where a well bred, liberally educated, and luxuriously inclined girl elopes with a coachman or a deck hand, the hasty espousals commonly end in misery for the wife. Several such elopements have recently occurred; and they seem to be “catching.” A Canadian girl of wealthy parentage read the story of the Morosini elopement, and thereupon got up an elopement of her own. The “catching” symptom is probably due to the glories of the reporter’s rhetoric.

* * * * *

Dr. Woodrow is the last clergyman who has had fame thrust upon him, for a peculiarly unsuccessful attempt to become an evolutionist. He first succeeded in getting Adam evolved from an ape or something, and left Eve to be created. More lately, he has, if we understand the story, evolutionized the first human pair from a pair of apes by _an accidental variation_. But there are no accidents in the genuine evolution; and Dr. Woodrow is being made fun of from both sides.

* * * * *

The extraordinary liberality of the English Wesleyans has attracted deserved attention and respect. They have collected very large sums of money for new churches in London and for missionary fields—millions of dollars in a few years. It is now noted that the Scotch churches have been visited with refreshing showers of the grace of giving. In one year the three branches of Presbyterians have raised more than seven millions of dollars for their own work. That sort of grace is proof of other and more spiritual sorts.

* * * * *

The Young Men’s Christian Associations have grown marvelously. Their New Year Book shows that on this continent this child of yesterday has created $3,400,000 in Association buildings, and put a great army of Christian workers into the field. Its rapid growth and vigorous work are one of the marvels of the time.

* * * * *

There is a notable lull in the storm against speculative and religious philosophy. The reason is plain. The hope that we should soon be able to see through creation and its cause with a microscope has begun to expire, if it be not already dead. This relegates science to its proper domain, and recalls reason to her old office. Some abatement of scientific enthusiasm as a speculative force is also to be noted. The British and American Associations at Montreal and Philadelphia did not show a puff of this sort of wind. Both attended strictly to scientific business.

* * * * *

Attention has been called to the fact that people may live too economically, by the havoc made by cholera among the under-fed Italian peasants. Statesmen in Italy complain that the rural peasants will save at the expense of vitality; in short, starve themselves. In this country people do not fast or eat insufficiently if they can get “square meals;” but they often starve their souls.

* * * * *

“Gath” is out with a sound letter against beer guzzling. “Boys,” he says, “were never seen in drinking places so long as whiskey was the standard.” That is so. Everybody knows that beer drinking by boys has become common. The sentimental argument that beer would cure drunkenness has come to this issue.

* * * * *

It is once more remarked that Jews are seldom victims of cholera. In France, it is said, only seven Jews were this year attacked by the disease. But perhaps this was a fair proportion of Jews when we count them and the non-Jews and make allowance for degrees of exposure to attack. It is not time yet to condemn the hog to extermination on this branch of the evidence.

* * * * *

There has been less than the usual supply of hazing barbarities in the colleges this fall. Some tragical results in former years have given the barbaric custom of outraging freshmen serious blows. Here and there a case of hazing has attracted attention this year. The evil has lost the prestige of honored custom, and is now more honored in the breach than in the observance. It will die without being regretted. Only brutal creatures, unfit for decent society, engage in this form of midnight violence.

* * * * *

Jean Robie, the Belgian flower painter, has a surprisingly versatile genius. He is exceedingly able as a colorist, and his flower-pieces have an enduring charm, but are so subtilely rendered that their reproduction is extremely difficult. A very successful effort has recently been made, by L. Prang & Co., to reproduce one of his latest works by color printing on satin. As a publication it is unique, and suitable either for an easel picture, panel decoration, or for framing.

* * * * *

Good Chautauquans everywhere have a warm attachment to the “Chautauqua Bells,” and will, we feel sure, unite with us in a vote of sincere thanks to the McNeely Bell Co., of Troy, N. Y., through whose courtesy, each summer, we hear the beautiful chime on the point.

* * * * *

David Dudley Field renews the demand for a change of the name of New York to Manhattan. It would be convenient, no doubt; but the change is not practicable. Besides, New York is already bigger than Manhattan Island, and Mr. Field wants to take in Brooklyn. The effect of the enlargement of the city is to make old Manhattan a section only of our American metropolis, which, if it gets what belongs to it, Brooklyn and Jersey City, will probably be the largest city on the globe in 1984.

* * * * *

Let no one twit the West any more on the subject of youth and inexperience. Michigan, Ohio and Indiana have participated in an earthquake—and earthquakes have chiefly favored venerable countries. This earth-shiver, following closely upon one on the Atlantic coast, confirms a scientific prophecy that seismic disorders would have a revival over a wide field in these years. Probably destructive earthquakes are not to be expected to occur in new regions.

* * * * *

A bad custom of gambling on the high seas, on the fashionable steamers, has at last been called up for rebuke. The evil has become intolerable to well-instructed people. The present writer has heard more than one man boast that he “made his passage money” by betting on cards during the trip. Fast steamers are rapidly becoming gambling hells.

* * * * *

A fashionable woman went to Saratoga this summer with twenty-one trunks containing ninety-three complete toilets. She wore from two to five toilets a day, and left Saratoga the day on which she had exhibited number ninety-three. This species of fool dies hard, but she is dying, and the world will by and by see the last of her. Respect for her decreases steadily; in a few years she will be less interesting than the shop window in which dresses are displayed on automata.

* * * * *

The United States Court in San Francisco has ruled that a Chinese man and a Chinese woman, though ostensibly married, are not one flesh. Judge Field said the country would be flooded with Chinese if women could come in on the certificates of their husbands. The decision relates to the right of Chinamen to return after visiting their fatherland. The golden gate is being gradually shut against these people; but they are now coming in across the imaginary boundary line between us and Canada. They can not be kept out. The effort to prevent their coming is “love’s (?) labor lost.”

* * * * *

We do not yet realize the greatness of this country. We knew long ago that there is an iron mountain in Missouri. Now we are told that there are four alum mountains in lower California, containing one hundred millions of tons of alum. Please do not invest in alum at present prices. “It may go lower.”

* * * * *

It is reported that a movement for reform in the city government of Chicago is ready to march. We suppose that the object is to influence the elections next spring. Some excellent results have followed these local organizations for good government. Their success depends upon the energy and enthusiasm with which they confine their work to home business. When they mix national politics with local reform they go to wreck. The excellent Brooklyn movement seems to have been close to the rocks this summer, through dabbling in politics. There ought to be no politics in administering the affairs of a city, no more than in a bank or lumber yard.

C. L. S. C. NOTES ON REQUIRED READINGS FOR NOVEMBER.

PREPARATORY GREEK COURSE IN ENGLISH.

P. 95.—“Gorˈgi-as.” (B.C. 487-380.) A Greek rhetorician and sophist. He captivated the Athenian populace by the splendor of his eloquence, and had among his pupils Alcibiades and Æschines.

P. 97.—“Socrates.” The advice given by Socrates, who was very fearful “lest it might be a matter of censure on the part of the state” should Xenophon take part in this expedition, was that he should go to Delphi and consult the oracle of the great god Apollo concerning the undertaking.

P. 98.—“Pæˈan.” One of the names of Apollo; afterward transferred from him to a triumphal song dedicated to him.

P. 100.—“Larissa.” Now Nimroud, and probably (with its excavated palaces) the southern portion of the vast circuit of Nineveh, “Resen” mentioned in Gen. 10-12.

P. 105.—“Brazen Utensils.” They very artfully forebore to molest these, trying in every way possible to lead the Carduchians to look upon them as friendly, so that they, the Greeks, might have a safe passage through the country.

P. 108.—“Centrites.” Now called Bohtan Chai; eastern branch of the Tigris.

Xenophon’s explanation: “For they,” his followers, “all knew that any one might go to him at breakfast, or at dinner, or, if it should be necessary, might rouse him up from sleep to say whatever one might have to say concerning the war.”

P. 112.—“Părˈa-săng.” A Persian measure of length; about four English miles.

P. 115.—The Armenians lived in underground houses then, as they do now, on account of the excessive cold of the winters. The great elevation of the uplands explains the extreme severity of the cold.

P. 119.—“Golden Fleece.” The Argonauts were the earliest heroes of Greek antiquity; they were the first to navigate unknown and dangerous seas. The story is as follows: Jason was ordered by his uncle Pelias, of Thessaly, to bring him the golden fleece of a ram which was nailed to an oak in the grove of Mars, in Colchis, and which was watched by a sleepless dragon. After a voyage full of adventures he and his followers reached the goal of their expedition. Æëtes, king of the country, promised the fleece to Jason on condition that he would perform some difficult and dangerous tasks. Medea, the king’s daughter, fell in love with Jason, and taught him how to overcome the dangers and seize the fleece. Then she fled with him back to Iolcus.

P. 120.—“Pancratium,” pan-crāˈshĭ-um. An athletic contest which combined boxing and wrestling.

P. 121.—“Ulysses.” A Greek hero of the Trojan war. For account of his arrival, “outstretched and asleep,” see “Preparatory Greek Course in English,” page 222, the fifth stanza from the end.

“Cerasus.” Whence our word _cherry_, which fruit was brought from this region into Italy by Lucullus in 73 B. C.

“Mosynœci.” A people celebrated for their warlike spirit and savage customs. Their houses were built of wood and were of conical form. Their government was very curious; a king chosen by them was strictly guarded in a house higher than the rest, and was maintained at public cost; but as soon as he displeased the people they starved him to death.

P. 128.—“Atrides,” a-triˈdes. The name signifies _son_ or _descendant_ of _Atreus_, and was bestowed especially upon Agamemnon and Menelaus. Agamemnon is referred to here.

“Keats.” (1795-1821.) An English poet. His chief works were “Endymion,” “Eve of St. Agnes,” and “Hyperion.” He died in Rome.

P. 129.—“Thetis.” The wife of Pelé-us, and mother of Achilles. She dwelt in the depths of the sea, and had the power of assuming any form she pleased. All the gods were invited to be present on the occasion of her marriage to Peleus, except Discord, who avenged herself by throwing into the assembly the apple which was the source of so much misery. Thetis foretold Achilles that his fate was either to gain glory and die early, or to live a long and inglorious life. The hero chose the former, and took part in the Trojan War, from which he knew he was not to return.

“Derby.” (1799-1869.) A distinguished English statesman; for several years a member of Parliament, and among the first and most eloquent orators of the time; was elected Chancellor of Oxford on the death of the Duke of Wellington, and was made Premier after Lord Palmerston. “His version of the ‘Iliad,’” says the _Edinburgh Review_, “is far more allied to the original, and superior to any that has yet been attempted in the blank verse of our language.”

P. 132.—“Newman.” An English author, born 1805. He was a great traveler, and wrote many works on historical, political, and theological subjects. He was a brother of John Henry Newman, who was converted to Roman Catholic doctrines.

“Worsley.” See “Preparatory Greek Course in English,” page 203.

“Ipsissimus.” His very own self. A strengthened form of the Latin pronoun _ipse_, meaning _himself_.

P. 134.—“Quære.” From the Latin word _quæ-ro_, meaning _to question_; whence our word _query_.

P. 136.—“Macedonia’s Madman.” A title given to Alexander the Great, so called because of his fiery, impetuous character.

P. 142.—“Empyrean,” ĕm-py-rēˈan. The highest heaven.

P. 144.—“Ajax.” One of the great chiefs of the Trojan War, second only to Achilles in martial powers. There was another of the same name, and the two were distinguished by adding the words _greater_ or _lesser_ after their names.

“Pelides.” Son of Peleus; Achilles.

“Phthiˈa.” The city in which Achilles resided, situated in the southeastern part of Thessaly. Thessaly now forms part of the Turkish province of Salonika.

P. 147.—“By this sacred scepter.” As the oath was a renunciation of service to Agamemnon, the general-in-chief, Achilles very naturally swears by his scepter, which was the emblem of regal power.

P. 148.—“Centaurs.” A race said to have lived on Mt. Pelion, in Thessaly. They were represented as half horses and half men, perhaps from the fact that hunting on horseback was a national custom. From this very easily the fable might have arisen, just as the Americans, when they first saw a Spaniard on horseback, thought horse and man to be one being.

P. 150.—“Ambrosial.” Divine, immortal.

“Here,” heˈre or heˈra. Juno.

P. 160.—“Achaians.” One of the chief Greek races. As they were the ruling nation in the heroic times, Homer frequently calls the collective Greeks by their name.

“Danaäns.” Another name applied to the Greeks. It was derived from Danaus, one of the earliest settlers in Greece.

P. 161.—“Neologism,” ne-ŏlˈo-gism. The introduction of new words.

P. 164.—“Tydides,” ty-dīˈdes. Son of Tydeus, Diomed.

P. 165.—“Son of Capaneus.” Sthenelus, commander of the Greeks under Diomed, and one of those who afterward were concealed in the wooden horse.

“Well-greaved.” Greaves were armor for the legs, a sort of heavy boots.

P. 166.—“Iris.” The messenger of the gods. She traveled on the rainbow.

P. 167.—“Ichor,” īˈkor. An ethereal fluid that supplied the place of the blood in the veins of the gods.

“Pergamus.” The citadel of Troy.

P. 170.—“Simoïs and Scamander,” simˈo-is, sca-manˈder. Rivers of Troy. “Simoïs,” also name of the river god. The Scamander was sometimes called _Xanthus_.

THE ART OF SPEECH.

P. 11.—“Leibnitz,” fon līpˈnĭts. (1646-1716.) Preëminent as a philosopher and mathematician. In his papers on “Language” he advanced theories which place him among linguists in the same position which Hallam considers him to hold among geologists, when he says: “Of all the early geologists, or indeed of all down to a time not very remote, Leibnitz came nearest to the theories which are most received in the English school at this day.”

“Halhed.” It may be of interest to note the various works which these scholars have contributed to the science of philology; Hălˈhed (1751-1830), an English author, prepared a “Grammar of the Bengal Language;” “Jones” (1764-1794), of whom it has been said that in the branch of literature to which he devoted his attention he undoubtedly surpassed all other Europeans, translated from the Persian, Turkish, and Sanskrit, and organized the “Asiatic Society” for investigating the language and customs of Asia; “Colebrooke,” kōlˈbrŏok (1765-1837), wrote a “Grammar” and “Dictionary of the Sanskrit Language;” “M. de Chézy,” deh shāˈzeˌ (1773-1832), was a learned and popular scholar, for whom a chair of Sanskrit was founded in Paris in 1815. W. Humboldt and A. Schlegel were among his pupils. He translated much and wrote a Sanskrit grammar; “Schlegel,” schlāˈgel (1767-1845) is said to be the first German who mastered Sanskrit, on which he wrote much; “Bopp” (1791-1867) founded the science of comparative philology. His greatest work was a “Comparative Grammar of the Sanskrit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Old Sclavonian, Gothic and German languages.” This work was translated into English by Prof. Wilson (1786-1860), who, while a surgeon in Bengal, had learned Sanskrit. Returning to England, he was made professor of Sanskrit at Oxford; “Grimm” (1785-1863), the great German philologist furthered the study by the discovery of the law by which words change their forms; “Weber” (1825-⸺), a pupil of Bopp’s, contributed a large number of translations and papers on oriental lore; “Kuhn,” kōōn (1812-⸺), also Bopp’s pupil, is called the founder of comparative Indo-Germanic mythology; for many years he has been connected as editor, with two German periodicals devoted to comparative philology; “Steinthal,” stīnˈtäl (1823-⸺), a Jew, is the author of several volumes on the classification of languages, primitive speech, the development of speech, and similar subjects; “Eichhoff,” āˈkofˌ (1799-⸺), a Frenchman, wrote a “Comparison of the Languages of Europe with those of India;” “Renan,” reh-nonˈ (1823-⸺), the French critic and author, has written a “History of the Semetic Languages,” and a treatise on the “Origin of Languages;” “Chavée,” shäˌvāˈ (1815-1877), a Belgian, has attempted to disprove the unity of the human race, in an “Essay on the Knowledge of Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, French and Russian Words;” “Müller,” müˈler (1823-⸺), the present German-English authority on language, has written several volumes, and Prof. “Whitney” (1827-⸺), at present professor of Sanskrit, in Yale College, is the author of works on “Language and the Study of Language,” the “Life and Growth of Language,” etc.

P. 17.—“Farrar.” Canon of Westminster, chaplain in ordinary to the Queen, and the author of several valuable works.

“Sporadic,” spo-rădˈic. Occurring singly or apart from other things of the same kind.

“Agglutinative,” ag-glūˈti-na-tive. Formed by agglutinations, as the union of several words into one compound vocable is called.

“Alloplylian,” ăl-lo-plylˈi-an.

P. 20.—“Estrays,” strays. Adopted from a law term referring to a lost animal.

P. 21.—“Humboldt.” (1767-1835.) A brother of the famous scholar and traveler of this name. He wrote much on language and comparative philology, his most ambitious work being a “Memoir on Comparative Linguistics.”

P. 26.—“Du Ponceau,” du-ponˈsō. (1760-1844.) His contributions to philology consisted of several treatises on language and a “Memoir oh the Indian Languages of North America.”

“Charlevoix,” sharˈlĕh-vwäˌ. (1682-1761.) A Jesuit missionary to America.

P. 29.—“Onomatopoetic,” ŏnˈo-mătˌo-po-ëtˌic. Words found to resemble the thing signified. The term is derived from two Greek words signifying to _make a name_.

P. 31.—“Heyse,” hēˈzeh. (1797-1855.) An able German scholar who wrote a valuable work on philology.

P. 33.—“Bleek,” (1827-1875.) He spent many years in Africa, where he collected materials for a “Vocabulary of the Mozambique Language,” and a “Grammar of South Africa.” He assisted in writing a “Handbook of African, Australian, and Polynesian Philology.”

“Schleicher,” shlīˈker. (1821-1869.) A German linguist, said to rank next to Bopp in comparative philology.

“Vinet,” ve-naˈ. (1797-1847.) A Swiss theologian and author, particularly well versed in the French language and literature.

P. 42.—“Ultimo,” etc. These expressions from the Latin have all English equivalents. _Ultimo_, on the last; _instanter_, at once; _proximo_, on the next; _cultus_, culture; _onus_, burden; _magnum opus_, a great work; _status_, state, standing; _curriculum_, course, particularly a course of study; _ultimatum_, the end, a final condition; _maximum_, the greatest; _minimum_, the least.

“Distingué,” etc. For these French terms we have equally expressive English words. _Distingué_, distinguished; _blasé_, surfeited, incapable of pleasure; _à merveille_, marvelously; _beau monde_, the fashionable world; _coup d’œil_, a quick glance; _demi monde_, loose livers; _haut ton_, aristocracy, the high toned; _coiffée à ravir_, charmingly dressed; _debutante_, a lady making her first appearance.

P. 47.—“Tooke.” (1736-1812.) A philologist and politician whose fame rests on one valuable work on language.

P. 49.—“De Quincy,” de kwĭnˈsĭ. (1785-1859.) His contributions to the art of speech consist of several valuable essays and literary criticisms.

P. 62.—“Kames,” kāmz. (1696-1782.) The most famous of all the various works of this eminent Scotch jurist was a treatise on the “Elements of Criticism.”

P. 63.—“Alford.” (1810-1871.). We are indebted to this English clergyman for a “Plea for the Queen’s English,” a very valuable book.

P. 75.—“Quintilian,” kwĭn-tĭlˈi-an. A Roman critic and rhetorician of the first century, the author of the “most complete and methodical treatise on rhetoric that has come down to us from antiquity.”

P. 81.—“Blair.” (1718-1800.) A Scottish clergyman whose “Lectures on Rhetoric” were famous in his own day, and until recently were used in a text-book in the United States.

P. 148.—“Aphæresis,” a-phérˈe-sis; “Syncope,” synˈcō-pe; “Apocope,” a-pŏcˈo-pe; “Prosthesis,” prŏsˈthe-sĭs; “Paragoge,” părˌa-gōˈge; “Synæresis,” syn-ĕrˈe-sis; “Diæresis,” dĭ-erˈe-sis; “Tmesis,” mēˈsis.

P. 149.—“Pleonasm,” plēˈo-nasm. “Enallage,” e-nălˈla-je; “Hyperbaton,” hy-pĕrˈba-tŏn.

P. 153.—“Theremin,” teˈreh-meenˌ. (1783-1846.) A German theologian and author.

P. 156.—“Paiezade,” pā-ē-dzäˈdĕ.

“Ruggiero,” rood-jāˈro. A young Saracen knight in Ariosto’s “Orlando Furioso.” He possessed a winged horse or hĭpˈpo-griff.

“Astolpho,” as-tŏlˈpho. Another character of the same work, a cousin of Orlando’s. He possessed a magic lance and a horn which routed armies with a blast.

“Frerabras,” frĕ-räˈbräs.

P. 163.—“Alliteration,” al-lĭt-er-āˈtion; “Iambic,” so called from the Greek _iambus_, the name of a foot consisting of a short and long syllable.

“Trochaic,” tro-chaˈic. From trochee (troˈkee), the name of the foot which forms the verse. The word trochee is derived from the Greek word for running.

P. 164.—“Anapæstic,” anˌa-pestˈic. Composed of anapests. Anapest means _struck back_, being so named because the foot is a reversed dactyl.

“Dactylic,” dac-tylˈic. Of dactyls. A word derived from the Greek for finger, and applied to this peculiar foot because of the similarity of the arrangement to that of the joints of the finger.

P. 187.—“Synecdoche,” syn-ĕcˈdo-che; “Anthropopathy,” ănˌthro-pŏpˈa-thy.

P. 188.—“Trope,” trōpe; “Metonymy,” me-tŏnˈy-my.

P. 192.—“Apostrophe,” a-posˈtro-phe; “Hyperbole,” hy-pĕrˈbo-le.

P. 194.—“Oxymoron,” ŏx-y-mōˈron.

P. 198.—“Ploce,” plōˈce; “Anaphora,” a-năphˈo-ra; “Epistrophe,” e-pĭsˈtro-phe; “Antistrophe,” an-tĭsˈtro-phe; “Anadiplosis,” an-a-di-plōˈsîs.

P. 203.—“Incongruentia,” in-conˈgrū-enˌshe-a.

P. 205.—“Innuendo,” ĭn-nu-ĕnˈdo.

NOTES ON REQUIRED READINGS IN “THE CHAUTAUQUAN.”

THE BONDS OF SPEECH.

P. 63, c. 1.—“Basques,” bask. The inhabitants of three Spanish provinces on the slopes of the Pyrenees. The government, customs and language of these people are peculiar and interesting. In government they are nearly republican. “Each province is governed by a parliament composed of representatives selected partly by election, partly by lot, among the householders of each county parish or town. A deputation, named by the parliament, insures the strict observance of the special laws and customs of the province, and negotiates with the representative of the Spanish crown. Delegates from the three parliaments meet annually to consider the common interests of the provinces; they employ a seal representing three interlaced hands, with the motto, ‘The three are one,’ but no written federal pact exists.” In their habits the people are very simple; agriculture is the principal occupation. They live on very equal terms, the class of nobles being small. The language was not written earlier than the fifteenth century. It is said to present some grammatical resemblance to the North American and certain East African languages.